From Publishers Weekly
In Diamond's far-reaching eco-feminist vision, the struggle for women's rights is inseparable from the struggle for ecological sanity, the eradication of militarism and opposition to the industrialized, wealthy nations' exploitation of poor countries. Her passionate, challenging manifesto critiques mainstream feminism which, she contends, has become stalemated by its contention that women's freedom resides in gaining control over women's bodies and sexuality. Diamond, who teaches in the University of Oregon's political science department, views new genetic screening techniques as part of a masculinist "medical heroics" that threatens the well-being and dignity of women. After scanning the damaging effects of agribusiness and Western-style development on traditional societies and their ecosystems, she outlines a diversity of alternative practices and protests--organic farming, small dam projects, community-based child care networks, campaigns for land redistribution in India, a women's "peace camp" on an English military base--that offer the possibility of sustainable social justice and democratic empowerment.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
In one of the most provocative and original feminist books in years, Diamond steps back from contemporary controveries over abortion, surrogacy, and pornography to gain a sharp new philosophical and moral perspective. Her arguments can be easily caricatured, far less easily summarized. She is a subtle and complex thinker who questions the unquestioned assumption of a woman's right to control her body. Ultimately, she says, we do not, any of us, control our bodies, for we are part of the flux of nature, and arguing for women's rights should not be divorced from a willingness to engage with the mysteries of birth, life, and death. Weaving in her personal history, reports on Third World women's movements, and critiques of contemporary thinkers, Diamond poses important questions and breaks ground for new thought about them.
Pat Monaghan
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
